


Neverland

by OtterlyDeerlightful



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Friendship, I can't write fight sequences, One big fight sequence, Tentacle Monsters, What a tweest?, mentions of family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-17
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-12-20 21:35:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21063551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OtterlyDeerlightful/pseuds/OtterlyDeerlightful
Summary: A giant sea monster of unknown origin is attacking and only Loki and Tony can stop it!





	Neverland

“Cool, right?” Tony asked, waggling his eyebrows at his friend as Loki suspiciously eyed the contraption in the inventor’s hands.

The otherworldly mage made a face and looked up at Tony for any semblance of a clue as to what the thing might be. He found nothing but the man’s unending excitement. Loki surrendered with a sigh.

“What…is it, exactly?”

Tony looked mildly offended. “_What is it_? Lokes, it’s a new bot! For you! Do you like him?”

Loki looked again at the strange thing. Now that he knew what he was looking at, the little black-and-green robot became more recognizable as such, taking on a more familiar shape for him to process now that he knew what to look for. One arm sticking out of the robot’s top waved lazily at the two men for lack of anything else to do to fill the awkward silence. Tony set his creation down and watched it roll toward its new owner, clicking and whistling like an excited puppy ready to play. Loki knelt down and rubbed his fingertips over its smooth surface while he investigated the hatch where the bot’s retractable arm had emerged.

“So?”

The mage looked up to where Tony was waiting expectantly and offered a smile.

“I am…touched. Truly, I am.”

“Well, I know you like Dum-E and U,” Tony said, hands in his pockets and rocking back and forth where he stood. “I figured I could make you a bot of your own.”

Loki let out a soft chuckle and turned his attention back to his new, metal companion. “What is its name?”

“Doesn’t have one. He’s yours…I figured you should do the honors.”

Loki hummed. The tiny robot squeaked happily in reply.

“BOT,” he said at long last.

Tony frowned. “Wait, really?”

The mage looked up at his friend with a mischievous smile. “Born of Treachery. It’s the perfect name.”

“_Perfect_? That’s a bad guy name if I ever heard one!”

“Exactly,” Loki purred with a smirk. “I do believe I need a _partner in crime_ as I believe the saying goes. Life gets rather dull around here sometimes and I think _this_ wonderful creature might be able to help me rectify that.”

Tony frowned. “I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?”

“Undoubtedly.”

The inventor opened his mouth to reply, but was swiftly interrupted by a blaring wail that echoed through the tower. Loki winced, never much caring for the sound, but never having the heart to say anything about it. Somewhere, there was trouble.

Tony pulled down a semi-transparent screen to survey the media for breaking news.

“Tell me a story, JARVIS,” he commanded.

“_Preliminary reports show a large creature has been sighted in Gravesend Bay and is proceeding to come ashore_.”

“What, they get lost on their way to a family reunion at the aquarium?” Tony asked aloud as he sorted through his incoming sources.

Loki came around behind him to get a better view of the screen while he worked. BOT, though not possessing any visible eyes, seemed to be mimicking his new owner, peering over Tony’s shoulder. The man quickly enlarged a few videos of amateur footage from various vantage points, all covering the same scene.

“Well,” the man huffed, eyebrows shooting up as he watched the unfolding events. “Shit.”

Loki gave his shoulder a rough pat at the sound of his teammate swearing, but continued to study the visuals before him. Large dark tentacles slammed into power lines, threw cars, and sent pedestrians running for their lives as the giant creature slowly hauled itself across the parkway. The last of its tentacles were just emerging from the bay, hoisting up the monstrous bulk of what the men could only assume was the creature’s head. It was bulbous, and with far too many eyes to be an oversized octopus like Tony had expected. An array of pulsing slits started near the center of its face and wrapped around to its sides, most likely some sort of gill system.

“What _is_ it?”

“I’m afraid I’m not familiar with the species,” Loki remarked, already materializing his armor and helmet in preparation for battle. “Much less it’s origin or why it has decided to make landfall here of all places.”

Tony made a face at the screen. “Maybe it came ashore to find a plastic surgeon, because whatever it is, that thing is _ugly_.”

“Not one of your better quips,” the god sighed.

Tony ignored him. He clapped his hands together and stood up, dismissing the screen. “Alright! Well, time to roll out, then.”

Within the minute, the pair were on their way. Tony sped through the sky in his suit, while Loki trailed slightly behind, propelled by a pair of boots that he had recently received as a birthday present from Tony. While the mage had insisted that birthdays were trivial markers on Asgard, given their lifespans, the inventor had insisted on a small celebration regardless, for which Loki had been secretly thankful. The boots themselves were an appreciated reminder of their bond, being custom-built to gift Loki the power of flight without restraining his movements. They fit perfectly over his own footwear and clothing, extending higher only to create a slight shield for his knees.

“I spy,” Tony’s voice rang over Loki’s earpiece, “With my little eye something that smells like dead fish.”

“I don’t _quite_ believe that’s how your sensory games are supposed to be played, Anthony.”

“You of all people shouldn’t be complaining about following rules.”

The beast’s lumbering form snapped another telephone pole. It uttered a low, dismissive whine as it was, presumably, electrocuted by the wires it had so thoroughly severed. It barely paused before continuing to drag itself toward the homes that lined the bay.

“I’ll go left, you go right and we can rein in Calamari Face here before lunch time. The last thing these folks need is to have to figure out if their home insurance covers acts of kraken.”

The pair took up their positions. The creature barely gave them a glance, clearly unconcerned with the flies buzzing about its head. Tony charged his repulsors, Loki readied green wisps of energy between his palms. With a mutual nod, the pair fired upon the creature.

The reaction was instantaneous. The hulking creature let out a bellowing roar as the blasts hit their respective marks. A fair share of its many eyes squinted in reaction to the pain before quickly locking on its assailants. In lieu of dashing away, the pair dodged the enormous tentacles that swiped at them from below and shot at it again.

“Stubborn bastard,” Loki heard his partner mutter through his earpiece.

The mage shot the Iron Man a glare of reprimand for his continued language, but said nothing.

“You know, even a flatworm would _back away_ from fire coming at its face. He might be big, but I don’t think his brain’s to scale.”

“Flatworms don’t technically have faces, Stark,” Loki pointed out.

“_Ugh_! That’s not the point!” Tony shot back as he dodged another tentacle. “The point _is_…oh shit.”

Loki would have shot his companion another disapproving glare if not for the reason Stark had cried out in the first place. What had appeared to be rows of gills along the creature’s sides now revealed themselves to have quite a different function. Dozens of small creatures rushed out from under the lifting flaps. Each of the black, disgusting things were nearly as big as Loki’s arm and complete with what appeared to be three sets of tentacle-like protrusions from their underbellies. From their sides were what appeared to be two pairs of thin, almost bat-like wings. While the creatures didn’t _look_ like they should have been able to fly with their mishmashed anatomy, they seemed to have very little problem with it in practice.

“On your nine!”

Loki twisted out of the way just in time to avoid having one of the tentacle beats run headlong into his side. He lashed out whips of energy at the suddenly swarming army of alien creatures, cutting them down as quickly as possible while still finding time to throw out bursts toward their original target to keep it at bay.

“They’re many, but they’re weak,” Loki noted aloud. “As annoying as they are, they’re little more than a distraction.”

“Yeah, well mothership was bad enough,” Stark replied with a huff as he shot a few more of the flying things out of the sky. “I really don’t want to play babysitter to a bunch of hentai monsters.”

Loki cocked an eyebrow. “A bunch of what?”

“I’ll, uh…explain later.”

They continued to fight. Occasionally, one of the awful flying things would latch on to an arm or leg with its tentacles, but luckily the aliens’ limbs weren’t nearly as prehensile as Loki had originally feared. They could wrap around you, yes, but they were unable to have any real _grip_ and could easily fall or be knocked away with little effort. It was the heroes’ only saving grace, however, as the giant that housed them continued to drag itself forward and swipe at its assailants any time either he or Tony ventured a little too close. At least it had closed its faux gills; whatever monstrosities that were flapping about were at least finite.

“This sucks!” IronMan shouted as he ripped a black creature from his torso and blasted another that had aimed at his face. “Where the heck is Thor, anyway?”

“With the Imbeciles Three, no doubt,” Loki replied as he threw a flying beast into one of its companions, sending them both falling to the ground. “I believe he was to be preoccupied with their nonsense until tomorrow morning. What of _your_ friends?”

“Rhodey and Nat are busy with something and the rest of ‘em didn’t answer their phones,” Tony replied, pausing only to blast at the giant creature again to keep it back from the rows of homes to which it was getting perhaps a little too close. “Hell, even Fury is busy. I think he’s over in France or something right now for something.”

“_Tony_,” Loki admonished.

“You’re as bad as Rogers!” the man complained. “Whatever. Looks like it’s just you and me against the space kraken and her brood.”

Loki teleported behind Stark, striking a particularly large creature that had been aiming at his teammate while he was already busy with two others in front of him.

“Thanks, Lo.”

“If you were more alert, I wouldn’t have to come to your rescue.”

“Aw, you like me! You _really like me_,” Tony sing-songed at him.

Loki rolled his eyes and sped off to get a better shot at the _space kraken_, as Tony had decided to call it.

“Aw come on, Lokes, you know you’d miss me if I was eaten by some spacey-sea monster.”

“Of course I would,” Loki replied with a playful grin. “If you were pronounced dead, I doubt the authorities would let me continue to use your credit cards.”

“I’m wounded!” Tony cried, unable to keep his laughter completely out of his voice while he clutched at his chest. “You wound me deeper than any tentacle monster ever could!”

Loki laughed and cut down another flying menace. He startled when Stark zoomed by and fired his repulsors at something above his head. The mage quickly moved out of the way of the falling corpse.

“Now who needs rescuing, Rapunzel?”

Loki made a face. “_What_ did you call me?”

IronMan shrugged. “You’re the one wearing the pony tail,” he pointed out.

The mage groaned in mild annoyance, but couldn’t exactly refute the observation. He had been growing his hair out for a while and was starting to get in the way at times. Like during battles with alien forces, for example. But he kept it anyway. It suited him and he liked it. So, instead of dignifying his companion with a retort, Loki instead focused his energies upon swooping down upon the monstrous beast below.

The creature’s miniature army was decimated, its few remaining members clearly handicapped by their encounters with Stark and himself. The _space kraken_ no longer had its living shield. Loki was the first to blast it with magic. He dodged out of the way of the nearest tentacle before throwing a well-aimed dagger into what looked like one of its more prominent eyes. The beast recoiled with a shriek and the Iron Man saw his opening to hit it with a few blasts from his gauntlets. The monster pulled back again, swiping at the pair of them only half-heartedly as it gathered itself.

“Steamroller?” Stark asked.

Loki nodded. “Indeed.”

Both men turned their attention toward the foe, arms outstretched. Before the creature could reach out toward either of them in retaliation, they let loose their energy. The kraken yowled as it slowly backed away from the sudden torrent of pain. It retreated from the road, backing toward the waves from whence it had come. It was, however, edging a little too close to a local shopping center for either of their liking. If luck was on their side, he and stark could have the beast back in the water before it reached the parking lot. Unfortunately, Luck was not one to often turn their way.

“At least we’re finally making some headway,” the engineer said, as if to break up the monotony of the work.

The space kraken let out a loud, gruff huffing sound before the gill-like flaps along its side began to lift again. Loki shot his companion an unhappy look.

“Me and my big mouth,” the engineer grumbled.

A new wave of small tentacle creatures began pouring from the crevices of their larger counterpart, wavering about in the air for only moments before locating and rushing their targets. The fight was on again.

Loki cut through the new swarm as he and Tony were quickly engulfed by their numbers. He tore down a few that were circling the Iron Man and Stark, in kind, blasted away the few that Loki couldn’t give his full attention. Below them, the space kraken was loudly groaning, pulling itself across a line of tennis courts on its way toward the shopping center just across the road. Even from his obscured vantage point the mage could see people still evacuating the area. They were running out of time.

Tony managed to break free from his cluster of alien attackers and jettisoned toward their living mothership. He blasted at the creature, distracting it hopefully long enough to give the pedestrians below a better chance to escape. Loki beat back the creature that had latched onto his arm. The giant beast below them bellowed and whipped its large tentacles toward Tony in retaliation. Loki didn’t even have time to call out to the man before the appendage met its mark, wrapping itself around IronMan and plucking him from the sky.

“Anthony!”

Loki could barely see the shining suit between the massive, undoubtedly heavy loops of the monstrosity’s muscular appendage. A red hand emerged from between the coils, a metal faceplate barely visible behind it.

“Lokes!” the man cried with an uncharacteristic desperation that made the mage’s heart tighten in his chest.

He fought his way toward his friend as quickly as possible, slicing through as many of the flying annoyances as he could. The only problem was that those who had previously been attacking Tony were now targeting Loki instead, and he was quickly being overrun.

“Anth_ony_!” he screamed as the flying beasts slammed into him one after another and wrapped around him. The sheer number of the things were started to weigh him down.

“_Loki_!”

He gathered his magic in his core, desperate to focus. The world around him slow felt as though it went quiet. One second passed, then two. Loki opened his eyes and released his energy. The blast exploded outward in a brilliant green ripple in all directions. The flying aliens were sliced in half, falling from the sky as a macabre rain. The mage focused his eyes on his friend—his best friend—and made a beeline for the inventor.

“Loki!” Tony cried weakly over his earpiece.

He could faintly hear the warning beeps from the suit as Stark spoke. The creature was crushing the suit, crushing _Tony_. Loki reached for his friend, hands outstretched to grab him, spare him before the hulking monster could do any more damage. He was close, so close…

“Tony, come inside! It’s time for lunch!”

The pair froze in place. They stared at one another for a moment before looking up at the apartment window overseeing the grassy lot in which they stood. Tony groaned and flopped back on the ground.

“_Mom_, we’ve gotta save Caesar’s Bay from the monster!”

The woman in the window rolled her eyes with an amused smile. “You can save it after you’ve had something to eat.”

The boy groaned.

“You’re welcome, too, Loki,” the woman continued, ignoring her son’s complaints. “We’re having hamburgers.”

Tony sat up with a grin, suddenly much more interested in the prospect of lunch over saving a shopping center.

“No thank you, Mrs. Stark. Mother said she was making apple pie.”

He smirked at the look of disgust Tony made. Frigga’s apple pies were famously delicious, of course, but Tony always acted like Loki was crazy for always wanting to eat the peeled apple skins that were left over. Sometimes he liked to eat them in front of his friend just to watch Tony gag.

“Well, tell her I say hello.”

“I will, Mrs. Stark.”

The woman in the window disappeared, leaving the boys to clean up and come inside on their own. Loki walked over to where he had left BOT, picking up the round rock with a long, thick wire glued to its side and a few dabs of paint to indicate its lights and sensors. He smiled at the gift and cradled it against his chest as Tony gathered up U and Dum-E, each of the irregular-shaped stones painted long ago with small, unsteady hands. An old battery was glued to each of them as a power source along with old pencil stubs for their arms.

“You wanna finish saving New York after lunch?” Tony asked hopefully.

Loki shook his head. “I can’t. My cousin Laufey is coming to visit for dinner and I have to help mother clean before father picks him up at the train station.” The little boy thought for a moment. “But…maybe you can sleep over tomorrow! Thor should be back by then, too.”

“That’d be awesome!” Tony agreed. “I’ll ask my mom if I can!”

Tony tucked Dum-E and U back into their padded box for safe transport home. Their things picked up, the pair headed back toward the apartment building.

“Can we save somewhere _besides_ New York next time?” Loki asked.

“Like where?”

Loki shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe Hoboken?”

Tony looked over at his friend and made a face, sticking out his tongue and wrinkling his nose as if he had just caught the scent of something obscene. “_Hoboken_?” he echoed. “Why would you want to save somewhere in _Jersey_?”

Loki gave a helpless shrug.

“Fine. We can save somewhere ‘sides New York. But not there.”

“Okay,” Loki replied rather passively. “Maybe we could save Bergen or something.”

“Where’s that?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere in Norway. Father says that’s where _his _father came from.”

“Cool. Okay, we save Bergen next time!” Tony agreed. He shifted his bots’ box to one arm and extended his free hand.

The other boy smiled and took it, the pair shaking on the decision before scurrying inside the building.

“You know,” Tony said as they plodded down the hall, “When we grow up, it’s gonna be awesome, Lokes. I’m gonna make a whole lotta money and we’re gonna make a _real_ Stark Tower and live in it. And I’m gonna have a _huge_ workshop in there where I can make real robots and AI stuff and everything.”

Loki made a face at that, clearly unconvinced. “I think you’re crazy.”

The brunette laughed and gave his friend a big smile. The gap from a recent lost tooth on full display. “Yeah,” Tony agreed, “But I doubt we’d be friends if I wasn’t, right?”

Loki giggled at that. He relented with a shrug and a small nod. “I guess. It _would_ be pretty cool to live in a tower together, though. We could have a real JARVIS and everything.”

“Yeah. It’s gonna be fun. My dad said he’s finally got a buyer for some of his ideas, so maybe he’ll have his own lab or something soon! I’ll have to see if we can use it!”

Loki doubted that would happen, but it _did_ sound interesting.

The boys stopped at the base of the stairwell to say their good-byes. Tony promised to ask his mother about the proposed sleepover and Loki thanked his friend again for his new BOT. Tony looked a little embarrassed, but gave the other child a smile.

“Yeah, well, you’re one of my best friends. And you’re, like, the only one who likes my bots, so…I wanted you to have one, too.”

Loki smiled.

“Bye, Lokes.”

“Bye, Anthony.”

One boy ran upstairs while the other continued down the hall. Loki opened the front door to his family’s apartment and walked in.

“Loki, sweetie, is that you?” a woman’s voice called from the kitchen.

“Yes, Mother!” he answered, following the delicious smell of cinnamon and apples to their origin.

Frigga looked up from where she was preparing a salad. She nodded toward the small kitchen table where a bowl of golden apple skins sat waiting under a shield of plastic wrap. Loki happily took a seat and carefully set BOT on the table to eat with him.

“Did you and Tony save the world again?” she asked.

“Almost,” Loki said as he grabbed an apple peel. “Anthony was going to get crushed by the monster and I was trying to save him, but then his mother said he had to come home. Oh, and she says hi to you.”

Frigga gave a soft laugh as she worked.

“Can Anthony stay over tomorrow?” Loki asked hopefully. “Once Thor’s home?”

“I don’t see why not, so long as his parents say it’s alright.”

Loki smiled happily at the news and turned his attention back to his apple skins. He glanced over at BOT and petted the little robot where he presumed its head to be. Maybe they would be able to beat the space kraken once Thor joined in the fight. Some stupid tentacle monster from outer space was no match for Loki and the Avengers, after all. They were superheroes.

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: I literally pinpointed an exact spot to have the boys' showdown take place. If you're super bored, you can find it on Google Maps with the clues I gave you XD


End file.
